Teen in the 80s - were Fair Isle jumpers a big thing at your school?

[DinoRodney]

I can totally remember everyone wanting one of these. And a friend’s mum making them for loads of us.

anyone else remember this quirky fashion?

I remember them in 1989-90 - I was at 6th form. I had a very cheap knock-off one. But, yes, there was a period when everyone was wearing them.

What were we thinking? 😂

I thought I was the bees knees in my fair isle jumper and Lee jeans 😃

To be honest, I’m in my fifties now and think jeans and a Fair Isle is a fab look.

Are we two the only ones on Mumsnet who remember this (or perhaps we were in a parallel universe)?

No we had loads of pleated skirts, sling backs and those v neck designer jumpers .... Pringles or something?

(not me though i was a goth)

It was Pringle ! That's so funny. The word just means the crisp to me now and sounds daft as a garment. Here they are:

Fair Isle and also Norwegian jumpers in NE Scotland 😂🥰

Yes, I had a cream and red one in 1982. I loved it. We also wore Lee jeans and 'bumpers.'

I had a French connection one which was bright and beautiful, it had buttons down the front and tassels

I remember Haircut 100 with a serious jumper game. But that was arran sweaters

My daughter and son were at primary school in the 80s. They had Fair Isle style jumpers referred to as Lopi jumpers. I thought I’d remembered the name wrongly but I’ve just googled and Lopi wool came from a breed of Icelandic sheep. I’m sure our neighbour who knitted them to order for every kid in the street didn’t use Icelandic wool but she called them Lopi jumpers. Here’s a photo of the style she knitted.

Don't think that fashion reached London. It was either goth/rock chick or pop princess looks where I lived, I was the former

I really like them, but not that recent trend when blokes were trying a bit too hard to look like a big salty seafarer.

I'd have loved one of them.
Instead, I had a purple bat wing jumper with a frog on the front. My friend had one that squeaked.
They were the rage back in 1985.

Early 80s here
Pepe jeans, Pringle jumper, Farah slacks

Early 80's for me too. I wore one with a short tartan kilt, wooly tights and Norwegian clogs. I loved that outfit and I thought I looked fab.

Pringle jumpers were v expensive and v posh - like a golf club chic - and were made int th Scottish Borders. There everybody wore them as they got them hugely discounted at the factory shop!

I had one! Got it from Laura Ashley and used to walk past the shop admiring it as it was out of my teenage price league - until a friend told me to "just bloody buy it" 🤣. Loved it so much... and have a photo of me with a couple of friends with all three of us in variations of Fair Isle on a navy background...

Mid eighties Canterbury Kent area, arran jumpers and doc boots !

I didn't, but my mum did. Peach and white with a frilly collar. I also remember lots of knitting books by Sasha Kagan and Kaffe Fassett with intricate patterns. And Benetton and Sweater Shop jumpers - so 80s and early 90s!

Of course in the very early 80s my uniform at the Monday night under 16s disco at the Cats Whiskers would have been black and white, by that I mean one panel of the skirt black, the other white and a black and white jumper separated diagonally.
As I walked past the living room to leave the house I could sense parents and older siblings holding back the laughter.
They needn't have worried, there was worse to come, the year after that Duran Duran released Planet Earth and I was full-on New Romantic. God how they laughed,

I'm a child of the 80s and don't remember this!

No idea of this trend in Manchester. The early 80's saw me looking slick in maroon velvet pedal pushers, frilly white shirts, leg warmers, ra ra skirts, trilby hat and fingerless gloves ( not all at once ) but never a fair isle, which would have been considerably less horrifying!

I remember arran jumpers and dr martens.